Bihar and The Holy Cow! of Indian politics

It is interesting to see so many celebrating Bihar's verdict, are in fact celebrating BJP's loss than JDU's victory. You have all the right to do what pleases you, so your fun is well deserved. Now that Delhi and Bihar have given you enough satisfaction of BJP bashing, lets look at the good, bad and ugly.

I don't mean to disrespect the choice, the people of Bihar made for themselves- they have all the right to do so. But this is an appeal to all the logical thinkers out there to look at the things in the right perspective.

The Good:

1. BJP's arrogance is rewarded

Following the news debates, it is pretty obvious to me that they became arrogant. They tend to go into Idolizing Modi mode, or Congress bashing mode, more than addressing the issues at hand. It serves them right that they have to face the humiliation.

2. Its proven that Muslim bashing will not work, for BJP

India has the 3rd largest muslim population in the world. It doesn't work to a policy to bash them as a community, as a whole. There has to be a way to address radical elements by not targeting an entire community. Pakistan, as an enemy state to India will celebrate, if India looses its development narrative, is a valid, politically incorrect statement. It is paradoxical that saying so in itself is an undoing of the cause.

3. Nitish Kumar will get another chance to drive his agenda (or really?)

Nitish Kumar was will always be remembered a leader that showed hope to the sad state of affairs of the state of Bihar. But by teaming up with the very person who is the reason for the failure in the first place, will he be able to maintain his sanctity- time will only tell.

The Bad:

1. The hypocrisy of the elite is pampered

Some of my friends complain that I use this word a lot. But what do I do, if I can see it more clearly than others. BJP is bad because they incite religion, but what about inciting caste for political gains? I agree that the BJP has become Arrogant, but that is nothing compared to the Arrogance shown by the elite, stereotypically represented by the top journalists. The way their faces light-up when they get a chance to bully a BJP spokesperson shows how grateful they are to the very system that fed them all the while, on the expense of the real people of the country.

2. India is forgotten

We want to prosper economically, stable and secure. Build a country that can stand on its own. Make agriculture more profitable. Indian culture should get a global recognition/respect. Values should be built, respected and protected in a way that corruption becomes an ethical outlaw. But instead, all that I hear is, lets punish Modi, because he is not as good as he claimed to be, or he has some people in his party with loose tongue. Saying that will make a Bakth, because that is what tolerant people do.

The Ugly:

1. A lie spoken 100 times becomes the truth

The intolerance is on rise when Beef is banned. But when is it really banned? The media makes it a sensation, and we fall for it, we debate it, we believe it. Porn is banned (for a couple of days). We outrage. Alcohol is banned, we celebrate. Why not? its not by BJP. A crime happens in a village in UP (Google says that India has around 638,000 villages), we return awards.

Lalu rises the issue in the election campaign, we celebrate him. Him, the Lalu Prasad Yadav- I have a point to make about him, which I will do a little later.

2. Ignorance

We are celebrating the victory of a team of three, two of whom are the very people we wanted to save the country from. Who am I to say, who is good or who is bad. I have 1 in 1.25 Billion right/share to decide what is right. But I tend to believe the philosophy that congress has become too corrupt to even resurrect, and I am representing that viewpoint in this blog.

Lalu and Congress, now share power. If that makes you happy, you have a real reason to celebrate. But if you are just celebrating because BJP lost, think again!

For someone who got into politics, hijacking JP's platform of social justice, became the epitome of corruption and misrule, made a public joke of the system, by running this sate on his wife's name, Lalu has his last laugh on the Indian people. He knows that he has the right to bring cow to the electoral fray, and BJP will have to/would ride that to defeat. He knows that he can publicly bash specific castes and that his victory would make the country more secular. He knows that he can stand tall on the platform of development, for which he himself destroyed to the core foundation, and the intolerant Indian's will tolerate.

This is my view on what happened, and this is what I think will happen next:

1. The radical voices in BJP will start taking over, now that Modi, Shah have failed twice. The irony is, that will give the hungry elite some more fresh oxygen to do some more Modi bashing.
2. The political equations will rally around UP and Punjab. Tamil Nadu elections will not see the glare in the national media.
3. Given that Caste and Indian Politics are inseparable and is an accepted thing, we have to see if BSP and BJP can come together. I think that depends on how well, Lalu and Nitish will get together. That tells us whether the congress can come back to its glorious dark past.
4. It will be interesting to see if AAP and Congress will come together for a pre-poll alliance, given that it is slowly being fed to us that corruption is a non issue and the real issue is secularism, tolerance or something else that will come up in an year from now, in these lines.

Anything else? Let me know in the comments, as well as your views on how you see these elections/results.

Blogging till Elections 2014

2014 is here! India is going to elections, this very year. And I want to get back to blogging. The amount of time I spend on news channels these days, I definitely need a channel to vent my views out. And this blog has, for so many times in past been a good friend to my mine, listening to all that I had to say. Frankly, Facebook hasn't been the best place, at least without making me feeling guilty of polluting my friends' timelines! And of-course I can feel like Arnab Goswami, in this own little blog of mine!

For as back as my memories go, I always did have an active interest in politics. My grandfather is a graduate (hons.) from BHU, Varanasi, 1948. If there is a reason I can think beyond what the mainstream education/media constantly prescribed me into, he probably has the largest contribution. As much as it is true that social media has given me a voice for promotion of my views, of late, it felt cluttered and unstructured. And that probably is the main reason I want to construct my view in a series of blogs that go till the general elections at a minimum. And after that, lets see where it takes us to! (Long story short, I am trying to prove my credibility to even write something as tiny as this, and you better be convinced)

And whatever I write in this blog, I completely understand that, it is 'a' point of view and there can be other points of view that are equally valid. And I encourage you to read my writing as a argument towards that point of view I am representing and give it a fair hearing.

Now that I have beaten enough around the bush, let me come to the political views I represent/support:

I am a believer of BJP. This is not so much because of Modi (exclusively). Nor is it because of the fact that Congress Govt. sucked big time. I will hopefully be able to explain, in enough detail as to why BJP stands closest to the ideologies I believe in- but that is for another time. All that I wanted to say at this time is, I am pro BJP and not anti-congress.

As many of you might have known, one of my very good friends, Rakesh, has joined BJP  recently Here is the 'yourstory' article, for more details. Having seen him closely in BITS, Pilani as Gen Sec and otherwise, I can see the value he can bring on to the Indian politics. For me, promoting him, is the closest I can get to, in claiming my contribution to the greater good of the Indian governance and politics.

The cultural identity that we are happy to let go of, is actually alarming. It is true that the urbanization has its own impact in terms of making us culture neutral. But if you keep that aside, as Indians, we are programmed to disown our cultural roots. So much so that following our traditions is considered ethnic in our own land (Dictionary meaning of Ethnic: Associated with or belonging to a particular race or group of people who have a culture that is different from the main culture of a country)

India, as of now, is growing despite government. Its high time that we have a government that can help the growth and development. Loosing the smartest of the people as brain drain or to unemployment has to stop. And that can only happen through a strong stable government and a political will.

There are many more, but these are the primary ones, and the reasons for me to start putting my political thoughts on this glass pane of yours! Trust me, politics can be more interesting than many other things that you do not probably know (like- lets say ice skating) and is as rewarding as the plant that Ashoka planted in our history books. Looking forward for your comments.